Mikhail Gorbachev (born March 2, 1931), was the leader of the Soviet Union and the General Secretary of the Communist Party during Drago's time as a boxer. He was the man who told Ivan Drago to come out of the Soviet Embassy to fight crime on the streets of the United States. In Rocky IV, Mikhail Gorbachev features in the role of the Soviet Premier, the leader of the USSR who cheers on Ivan Drago, but is the first in his cabinet to applaud when Rocky Balboa wins the boxing tournament and makes his motivational speech on change, forcing the other Politburo members to subsequently follow suit. This is a possible reference to Gorbachev's policies of Glasnost, Perestroika and Demokratizatsiya reforms that occurred during his leadership of the Soviet Union.

Likeness of Gorbachev displayed over boxing ring in the Soviet Union in the fights of soviet boxer Ivan Drago in Rocky IV